Potty Vertical Cross Single

[sbwhart]

Just started on building a Vertical Cross Single, its very loosely based on the Kenion Engine that can be seen at the Northern Mill Engine Society at Bolton http://www.nmes.org/ I've designed it along the lines of the simple horizontal engine that can be made with limited equipment and has a lot of parts common to or similar to this engine.

This is my progress to Date



If any one would like a copy of my V1 drawings just send me a PM with you're email address and I'll fix them up, but at the moment this is very much a work in progress so the drawings will change.

Stew

[Jim Nic]

As with a lot of your engines, Stew, this one looks a little out of the ordinary and I will follow it's progress with interest.  Some of your previous engines have looked a little advanced for me but this looks like a good step on my learning curve.

Jim

[Jo]

Nice little engine 

I assume you posted the Pdf upside down to make it easier for our Aussie friends to read it 

Jo

[tel]

No Jo - it is in fact, a ceiling engine - the later development of the wall engine! 

Yes please Stew!

[steamer]

Stew,

You already got my PM....Looking forward to the build!

Dave

[Johnb]

Nice!

Reminds me of the colliery winding engines used in the north of England.

[Pete49]

Another nice engine Stew. I'll PM you but will wait until your happy with the drawings. Plus its a bit warm in the shed lately 40-45C+ for some days though better today (high 20's, nice and cool) so I can catch up on some honey-dos.
Pete

[sbwhart]

Nice little engine 

I assume you posted the Pdf upside down to make it easier for our Aussie friends to read it 

Jo

  I messed that up 

Nice!

Reminds me of the colliery winding engines used in the north of England.

That is because it is:- It was built back in the 1850 in the north east for that job then a thrifty Yorkshire man bought it and had it installed into an Huddersfield mill in 1910 after a bit of rework by Lumb.

This is what they say about it at the Northern Mill Engine Society

"This is a vertical cross-compound engine and is believed to be the only survivor of the type in the UK.

It was removed by the Society in 1977 from Messrs Jonas Kenyon's Dearneside Mills in Denby Dale, near Huddersfield when the company closed down. The original intention was to rebuild it in Yorkshire but for various reasons this never happened and the parts of the engine lay in various fields for 30 years. Eventually, when it was finally threatened with imminent scrapping, we brought it to Bolton in 2008

The original engine-maker is unknown, but we do know that it was rebuilt from earlier parts and installed at Dearneside Mills in about 1900 with the assistance of James Lumb & Sons of Elland, who were better known as makers of steam engine governors, recorders and other accessories.

It has a number of unusual features, including a special "trip gear", patented by James Lumb in 1892, operating a supplementary slide valve on the high-pressure cylinder.

Inside the valve-chest of the high-pressure cylinder during restoration.
One of the supplementary valves is shown arrowed

The use of a supplementary valve riding on the back of the main slide valve was quite common on slide-valve engines in order try to improve the part- load economy by varying the point in the stroke when the supply of steam from the boiler was closed off. The most common type was possibly the "Meyer" valve which was driven by a separate eccentric that moved the extra valve out-of-phase with the main valve. However, James Lumb's patent took this idea a stage further and incorporated a "trip" system that allowed the supplementary valve to snap back suddenly to close off the steam at a particular point in the stroke controlled by the governor. Rapid valve closing was important in getting the best economy from an engine and in this respect it was very similar to the "Corliss" valve mechanism, widely used on many mill engines, especially in the textile industry.

The engine is also fitted with a series of long bars or links that force the piston rod to move vertically up and down in the cylinder, without the use of a machined cross-head. The original for this brilliant idea was invented by James Watt and can be seen on virtually every beam engine as "Watt's parallel motion". However this version was patented by Phineas Crowther in 1800 and was applied to many colliery winding engines in the North-East coalfield, but was not widely used elsewhere. The fact that this engine still retains this feature suggests that the original engine, before its rebuild in 1900, may have been quite old. The two cylinders of 14" and 26" diameter drive two cranks set at 180 degrees on either side of a central 14ft diameter flywheel at high level. The stoke is 3ft. The steam is used twice (compound) and the engine drove the mill via two large leather belts running on the rim of the flywheel

And a few pictures of it










This original engine is a twin cylinder engine, but my much simplified vertion will be a single but it should be a straight forward job to add an extra cylinder.

Stew

[sbwhart]

Fished off some more parts, I was a bit unsure how to make the valve stem support I wonted a design that could be made without a mill I hit on the idea of using some cold drawn angle I had.

These are the parts



I like the look of it.



I'll slap a bit of JB weld on it so it looks more like a casting. It won't be easy to adjust the valve events but I'll deal with that when I get.
to it.

Just given my shed its pre Christmas clean out and oiled my machines so that me closed down for the holiday.

All have a good Christmas

Stew

[sbwhart]

Herr's wishing you a happy a prosperous new year.

Got a few more parts made, the swing arms took a little creative thinking I want this engine to be within the capabilities of a Newbie with a modestly equipped shop, the holes in the swing arms need to be symmetrical with them selves and with each other, I started off by first centre drilling a pip on the end of each arm I then marked them out to give a guide as to where to cut away the meat,


 I then drilled the centre 4mm hole, then pinned the two arms together with a 4mm dowel I then drilled one 3mm hole all the way through both arms, I then swivelled the top arm 180 deg and used it as a guide to drill the second hole in the bottom arm, flip them over and do the same to the other arm this way they must have the same centre distance and be symmetrical to each other.





Then into the four jaw and supported on the centre chew away the unwanted bits, then cut off the pip and finish off to shape with filing buttons.



This is how its looking



Stew

[arnoldb]

Good going Stew 

I like that valve guide!

Kind regards, Arnold

[b.lindsey]

This will make a fine model Stew and I will be following along as well. Nice work on it thus far too.

Bill

[sshire]

Good one, Stew.
I always follow your builds because I learn something with each one.

[philjoe5]

Very clever work making those swing arms Stew.  All on the lathe and drill press?

Cheers,
Phil

[sbwhart]

Thanks for your interest Guys.

Nothing done on the engine over the last few days we've had other priorities hope to get back on it tomorrow.

Stew